Ford Escort RS1800 Mk.II [Italeri 1:24]

My starting kit is an Italeri Mk-II Ford Escort RS1800 from the 1979 Monte Carlo entry, in 1/24 scale.

Although the original kit is a full-spec rally car, I have built it as an homage to our family car - an ex-police Mk-II Escort - into which my Dad dropped a tuned 1600cc (I'm not sure if it was a Twin Cam or not), added larger wheels/tyres and finished it off with 2x Cibie foglamps and 2x Wipac spotlights. And an airhorn.
Before it was put up for sale, the police resprayed the doors, bonnet and boot lid the same colour as the rest of the car, -which I have tried to match - hence the really weird shade of blue.

The kit's bodywork was quite well moulded, with only a few imperfections, mainly on the window frames and seems. The tyres, on the other hand, were atrocious. Each of the 4 tyres supplied had holes, gouges, or were so unevenly set that they were no longer round, or evenly rimmed. The wheels are very reasonable copies of Minilites, beloved by competitors and enthusiasts alike.

I tried a silver/chrome backing to the extra lights, but they didn't look right, so they have been resprayed gloss white. I kept the rally seats and harnesses; I'm sure Dad would have competed in this car - as he did in our other cars - if he'd had the opportunity. The pins fixing the extra lights to the front quarter bumpers are ridiculously small - 1mmx.5mm - and I found it impossible to set them using the pins alone.
I'm not sure why, but the pedals are located all the way forward in the cockpit, much too far away for a driver to be able to use them (it may be that I placed them in the wrong position). The fire extinguisher and the spare are a nice touch.

The roll cage came in 5 separate parts, each of which was supposed to be fixed using a tiny nodule in a tiny, tiny hole. I barely managed to assemble it, once, and only once. Even after I drilled a small channel into the plastic and inserted a tiny brass shaft, I never managed to fit it into the car.
I eventually fashioned a new roll-cage using thin plastic tubing and surgical tape. Once it was sized it was primed, then sprayed orange/red and, finally, I created some cautionary decals (in French).
While remaining fixed at the rear of the cockpit, the front of the roll-cage can be lifted and repositioned, allowing it to be fitted flush against the glass canopy. The use of surgical tape allows each section to be moved/rotated relative to the others.

For the bodyshell, I added both decals from the original kit, and decals designed in Adobe Illustrator. These decals are printed on special A4 paper which is then varnished (I have found Humbrol Clear Cote works best) before being cut out and applied in the usual manner.

At this point, the front of the car body was still riding a little high. To lower the front I cut about 3mm from the front suspension struts. A small cutout was made in the exhaust manifold, and a channel cut into the bottom of the engine block to accommodate the lower ride height. To keep the roll-bar attached to the wheels, I used a hot blade to flatten the plastic pins.

The beauty shots were taken against a backdrop of two white canvases, placed at 90 degrees to each other.
The delicate nature and fittings of the wing mirrors, spotlights and front spoiler mean that they have not been permanently attached using glue - as this kit is being posted overseas I didn't think they would survive the journey. Instead, I have packed them separately so my Dad can fix them upon its arrival.

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